Brandon's Ecuadorian Tales

Sorry! Its finals week, but here's his e-mail this week!

Hey everyone, I hope all is well at home. Let me tell you about this week in Ecuador.

On Monday night at midnight all the new guys and a few others that had to renew their visas got on a bus headed for Quito (its about a 7 hour drive from Esmeraldas to Quito). We were all really tired and fell asleep pretty quick. But at about one in the morning we were awaken when the bus came to a stop and some cops came on and told us all that we had to get off. I wasn’t sure what was going on so I just went with it. When I stepped off the bus I noticed that we were in the middle of nowhere and there were a bunch of cops with big assault rifles with there fingers on the triggers. I asked another missionary what was happening and he said they were checking for drugs since we were coming from near Columbia. Anyways, then they made us all line up against the bus and started going down the line checking everyone one by one-patting them down searching there bags and checking there IDs. That’s when I realized that I didn’t have any ID on me whatsoever. I asked one of the missionaries what I should do and he just said to tell them that I was going to Quito to get my censo and that I was a missionary. When they got to me they asked me for my ID and I said I didn’t have it and they started to get really mad. So then one of the other missionaries tried to them but that just made them madder. Then one of the Cops with the big assault rifles starts walking towards us (that was pretty scary) and started talking to the other cops. Anyway, long story short the guy with the gun ended up convincing the other ones that we were their friends and they let us go. It was pretty scary for a while though.

Quito was really cool though. I remember when we first landed there and got out of the airport and I thought it was the most ghetto place I had ever seen. But after being in Esmeraldas for a while and going back it seemed like one of the nicest places I had ever seen. All of us Esmeraldas guys were way excited to be there. We had donuts for breakfast and McDonalds and pizza hut for lunch. And we went to the mission office and I got 6 packages and a bunch of letters. I wish I could write everyone that sent me something to tell them thanks you but I don’t have the time. So can you please extend my thanks to everyone that has sent me something- both sets of grandparents, the Rowes, the Gromans, and there might be more that I cant remember right now. But anyway, Quito was way awesome. I definitely won’t complain if I ever get sent there. They have pretty much everything that we have in the states.

So other than my trip to Quito the rest of the week was normal. We have 10 investigators with baptismal dates for the 26th so were working hard to make sure we can prepare them all. Sunday was fast and testimony meeting and right after it started no one was getting up so I decided I would just break the ice and went up and bore my testimony first. Then it was good after that. One of our investigators got up and bore their testimony about how they’d been searching for the truth their whole life and finally found it and how they wanted to share it with all there friends and family. His name is Emiro. He really wants to get baptized but is trying to save up enough money to go to Columbia and divorce someone so that he can marry someone else that he’s living with now.

We went to the Christmas devotional last night but the satellite didn’t work so we didn’t get to watch it. I was bummed because I had been looking forward to it all week.

We found a huge rat in our apartment and my companion told me that it was big enough to eat our feet so hopefully that doesn’t happen. Haha

Anyways, I love you all. Thanks for your emails, letters, and packages!


p.s. Lindsey, can you tell everyone that has written me that I’m trying to right them back as fast as I can and I promise I will get back to them eventually! Oh and if you haven´t already, you can post my pictures on facebook or on my blog. Thanks! :D